


Papyrus's Baby Pictures

by ArgentDandelion



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Character Study, Compare and Contrast, Meta, Nonfiction, Skeletons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-09
Updated: 2019-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:02:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28033587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArgentDandelion/pseuds/ArgentDandelion
Summary: Analysis of various artists' depictions of Papyrus as a baby or child, with reference to real human skeleton growth patterns. Also includes brief analysis of Sans' appearance as a baby.
Kudos: 2





	Papyrus's Baby Pictures

  
Artists featured here: [Zarla-s](http://zarla-s.tumblr.com/), [Insanelyadd](https://insanelyadd.tumblr.com/), [Deadpool4ever](https://deadpool4ever.tumblr.com/tagged/papyrus/), and [C-Puff](https://thefloatingstone.tumblr.com/) (thefloatingstone).

Papyrus, as previous posts have noted, has a pretty manly face and pseudo-physique compared to Sans’. Yet, in works where Papyrus and Sans weren’t reanimated skeletons frozen at the age of their resurrection, Papyrus must have been a baby at some point.

What would his baby pictures look like?

* * *

## What Makes Papyrus Distinct, and How to Avoid Sans Convergence

It’s pretty common to draw Sans and Papyrus as little kids. This can be more difficult than it sounds, for two very different reasons.

First, since Papyrus’s design is often interpreted in a way that makes it look pretty manly and mature, artists have to figure out how to make an aesthetically-appealing “Little Papyrus” design that’s still recognizable as him. Related to this, one has to make a Papyrus design that doesn’t look too much like Sans.

The reader might wonder: _‘How is that possible? They look so distinct!’_ Well, in a nutshell, it’s because making Papyrus younger means making him cuter, and proportion-wise, modern-day Sans is simply _cuter than Papyrus_. So, if one strays a lot outside canon proportions in the interest of cuteness, baby Papyrus might end up looking like Sans. (This is especially true if one avoids giving little Papyrus long, gibbon-like arms, as he has in canon)

A few things distinguish Papyrus’s design from Sans’s. Body-wise, he has different jaws, eyes, teeth, and cheekbones/smile bulges. Sans never opens his mouth in-game; as he lacks distinct jaws, some assume his jaws are fused and his smile is more-or-less stuck in place like the Pokémon Glalie. Papyrus, however, has a distinct jaw with distinct teeth. His eyes are tall, narrow, and asymmetrical. Furthermore, the bulges around Papyrus’s eyes are often interpreted as zygomatic bones (cheekbones); as ambiguous as it is, Sans lacks similar structures.

* * *

##  **General Trends**

(Papyrus looks pretty chubby, but he’s not. It’s just loose clothing.)

Some trends used when adapting Papyrus to a younger version hold true for character design in general.

One example is the changes of the Pokémon Charmander to Charizard, or Gible to Garchomp. The first in the lines are, overall, rounder, shorter, and chubbier, with proportionately bigger eyes and heads, shorter snouts, and taller foreheads. Later ones in the line are pointier (e.g., Garchomp has lots of spikes) and more complicated (e.g., Garchomp’s arm-lines, Charizard’s horns and bony wings).

Some trends are specific to Papyrus, however. Since Papyrus is a skeleton, he can’t really be chubbier-looking as a baby/kid.[1] For that matter, he can’t actually look more muscular when grown. He can, however, be dressed in baggier clothes when little, and in an outfit (i.e., his “battle body”) that makes him just look muscular later.

* * *

##  **Specific Trends**

###  **Eyes**

  
Generally, younger characters are cuter. Intuitively, big eyes are cute, so a younger Papyrus’s eyes are sometimes made bigger and cutesier. However, it’s kept from copying Sans by making the eyes oval-shaped or just thinner than Sans’ sockets.

_Samples_

Zarla’s choice is unusual in the sample. Papyrus’s actual sockets never change as he ages; rather, he gets little creases below his eyes over time.  
Allesia’s choice[1](https://argentdandelion.tumblr.com/post/186173004670/papyruss-baby-pictures#fn:2) is unusual in how she makes Papyrus’s eyes so much bigger (in her [reference sheet](https://allesiathehedge.tumblr.com/post/182378957876/papyrus) for Papyrus aged 9-10): his sockets aren’t simply taller or wider, but a completely different shape from adult Papyrus. In fact, it’s a similar shape (if smaller) to that of kid Sans (age 11-12) in the same work: the biggest difference is that Papyrus’ eyes lack pupils.

###  **Jaws**

In human skulls and faces more generally, from babyhood onward the lower jaw (mandible) gets longer and thicker. This is especially true for adult male skulls, which are also fairly squared-off from a frontal view. It’s mainly jaw growth which leads to the trend of Papyrus heads getting taller and narrower over time.

When making a baby Papyrus design, it’s common for artists to do some of the following: make Papyrus’s mandible wider, shorter (in height), have a smaller bottom of the jaw/chin, with shorter, more rounded jaw cutouts behind the teeth (i.e., Zarla and Insanelyadd).

When it comes to more drastic changes, some artists change the very way his jaws articulate. A baby or toddler Papyrus might have a lower jaw not really distinct from the surrounding bone, or a jaw that doesn’t fit beneath the cheekbones and temporal processes (a little bridge of bone next to the cheekbones). Some artists even make little Papyrus’s _teeth_ rounder (not a human skull trait), remove a gum-line, and give him fewer teeth, such as through an overbite. In this way, little Papyrus can have a completely different tooth style from modern-day Papyrus.

_Samples_

Deadpool4ever’s little Papyrus has a fitted jaw in both the “First Day of Elementary School” comic and “Sick Little Sans” comic, but in Deadpool4ever’s comic excerpt of the famous _Flowey is Not a Good Life Coach_ (by unrestedjade), more-or-less modern Papyrus has non-fitted mandibles.

###  **Cheekbones**

Papyrus’s cheekbones are often one of his distinctive traits, but it’s not really babylike. Some artists give him bigger, pointier cheekbones as he gets older. This is pretty realistic: real human skulls do get bigger zygomatic bones (cheekbones) over time.

_Samples_

Insanelyadd’s newborn-Papyrus, Papyrus at Age 3, and more-or-less modern Papyrus are remarkable in that cheekbone size and position aren’t linear. Instead, certain parts of it apparently change at different rates over time.

Deadpool4ever’s choices are unusual: in this comic on Papyrus’s [first day of school](https://deadpool4ever.tumblr.com/post/163536233887/first-days-can-be-really-tough-good-thing-paps), toddler Papyrus’s cheekbones are big and fairly round, but in a comic excerpt of the famous _Flowey is Not a Good Life Coach_ (by unrestedjade), his cheekbones, if he has any, or indistinguishable from his mandible.

* * *

## Bonus: Sans’ Pictures

  
But how would you make baby pictures for _Sans_?

The trouble with Sans is that he’s already very neotenous. He has a small nose (or rather, nose-hole), a big, rounded skull, short lower jaws, and big eyes, even without artists exaggerating eye size. Making this more complicated is the fact he’s short for a presumed adult and, somehow, chubby-looking for a skeleton. (Probably just his fashion style)

Some, seeing Sans’ big eyes, make them even bigger, or subtly change the shape to be rounder. Others give him a proportionately bigger, rounder head, with a taller forehead. Some figure the lines underneath Sans’ eyes are like tired eye-bags, and so give baby/kid Sans no eye lines. Some make it a matter of expressions, giving Sans a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes.

_Samples_

Zarla takes a unique variant: rather than making baby Sans’s eye-holes any bigger (in absolute or relative terms) she makes the _pupils_ much bigger.

* * *

 **Related Reading** s

  * [Papyrus is (Maybe) A Manlier Skeleton than Sans](https://argentdandelion.tumblr.com/post/180806697456/papyrus-is-maybe-a-manlier-skeleton-than-sans)
  * [Papyrus is Probably a Better Boyfriend than Sans](https://argentdandelion.tumblr.com/post/176242961208/papyrus-is-probably-a-better-boyfriend-than-sans) ([especially Part 3](https://argentdandelion.tumblr.com/post/176747022689/papyrus-is-probably-a-better-boyfriend-than-sans))
  * [Tips on Skeleton Design](https://argentdandelion.tumblr.com/tagged/Tips-on-Skeleton-Design/chrono/)



* * *

* * *

  1. The author couldn’t obtain permission to feature her art in time, but has provided a link to the art used for analysis. [↩︎](https://argentdandelion.tumblr.com/post/186173004670/papyruss-baby-pictures#fnref:2)




**Author's Note:**

> The author enjoys comments. Feel free to comment, either here or on the author's [Tumblr](https://argentdandelion.tumblr.com/) or [Pillowfort](https://www.pillowfort.social/posts/1888295).


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